Anyone have experience with rabbit epilepsy?

[Bianca]

My friend rescued a rabbit a few weeks ago. She was up with her horses when the young rabbit approached her. It wasn’t a wild rabbit, and was very friendly. So she took her home. She found out that a car had been driving around the area suspiciously slowly the day she found the rabbit too, so we suspect dumped.

The rabbit is quite young, just weaned sort of age. For the most part she is active, healthy, and happy. And super confident and friendly. But she started occasionally having what I could only describe as a seizure. My friend has never owned a rabbit before so she sent me videos and asked for advice. The rabbit will collapse, lose all or most control of it’s legs (usually the back ones), eyes wide, and will sometimes still try to crawl around but appears to not be very aware of it’s surroundings. Then a minute or two later it will be fine again, eating, acting normally, drinking, pooping, weeing. 

She took her to the vet I recommended this morning. The vet checked for ear infections and EC but said as the rabbit is otherwise healthy he suspects epilepsy. The vet couldn’t do anymore for the rabbit and suggested a specialist vet. Unfortunately they can’t afford that right now, so the vet recommended keeping her as safe as possible during seizures, and that if they get too frequent or worse, then consider having her PTS. 

Right now Thumper is happy, healthy, a good weight, eating and pooping normally, and I believe isn’t having seizures too often. I suggested to my friend making sure that her environment is safe and there are no small places she could get stuck having a seizure. But  I was wondering if anyone else has any advice or suggestions or experience with anything similar? 

Thanks in advance.

[LBJ10]

True seizures are rare in rabbits. How did they check for EC? Many vets will treat for EC anyway. It probably wouldn’t hurt anything to try it. There are other parasites and diseases that can cause seizures, but they are less common.

If it truly is epilepsy, then there are anti-seizure medications that can be used. I think diazepam is most common.

[jerseygirl]

Wow. I hope there weren’t others that age dumped.

Given the age, I wonder if there might be nutritional deficiency? Magnesium, potassium, Vit E/Selenium??

[Muchelle]

If there are any animal shelters in the proximity of their home, suggest your friend to call them and ask if it would be possible to access a specialized vet for a neurological evaluation. I don’t know personally about epilepsy in buns, but during one of my bun’s stay at the vet I’ve talked to an owner who had this problem and they kept it at bay with a minimal dose of meds (pretty much similar to human’s treatment), so once the entity of the problem is assessed it might to turn out as a permanent, but low manteinance issue. This is in case it’s really not a nutritional problem, which can be assessed by weighting and drawing a blood sample.

In the meanwhile, your friend should offer her the best diet possible and keep track of her appearance (are her sides sunk in? is her belly round? her coat is shiny?) and when and with what intensity she’s having those symptoms, so that once she can get to the right vet she has a clear situation to present them.

Also, do thank her for picking that little baby up <3

[Bianca]

Thanks everyone!

I’m not sure what checks the vet actually did, I too was surprised Thumper wasn’t put on EC meds to be safe.

Thumper is otherwise healthy, shiny, looks and acts completely normal. If you didn’t know she has weird episodes, you wouldn’t guess.

Jerseygirl – any idea how we could go about giving her a boost in any of those if she is deficient?

Muchelle – Unfortunately the shelter themselves have a lot of trouble accessing the specialised rabbit vet, and it would be the same one our local vet offered to refer her to I expect. If Thumper gets any worse it’s definitely a path I will help my friend look into.

Thumper is on a very healthy diet, but it is possible she was dumped before a safe weaning age so being deficient in something wouldn’t surprise me. I hope there were no others dumped too, but my friend saw no sign of any others. Thumper approached them and let them pat her and pick her up straight away. Since coming home with them she has become very attached to them, and often licks and cuddles with them. She constantly tries to share her food with the cats too – through the bars of her enclosure. She gets lots of play time outside her enclosure but not with the cats while she is so young. She plays like a normal rabbit her age – lots of zoomies, binkies, and flops.

[Bianca]

Another update: I asked when the seizure or seizure like symptoms normally occur. She said every single one (that they have witnessed) has been after bouts of excitability/zooming around like crazy, apart from one that occurred with no prior exertion, but it was the hottest day we have had this year.

[jerseygirl]

Posted By Bianca on 10/29/2017 5:57 AM

Another update: I asked when the seizure or seizure like symptoms normally occur. She said every single one (that they have witnessed) has been after bouts of excitability/zooming around like crazy, apart from one that occurred with no prior exertion, but it was the hottest day we have had this year.

I wonder if she’s doing something to her spine during this time? Or even the hips?

After reading your lastest post, Im less inclined to think could be nutritional. But to answer your question, one of the things Ive commonly heard of to help with potassium is to give tomato juice from canned tomatoes. Magnesium, you could use something like Kruse’s fluid magnesia or just a powder added to water. Vit E – liq caps opened and squirted in the mouth. But if she is okay on greens, dark leafy ones with give some magnesim and vit E.

[LittlePuffyTail]

I’m sad to read about this. I wish I had some helpful advice.

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